Who were the Roman mathematicians, and what were their contributions to Western mathematics?

The ancient Romans were not known for their contributions to mathematical knowledge. While they certainly knew math in order to build roads, aqueducts, and other structures, there were no major advances in the field of mathematics that came from the Roman Empire. However, there were a few notable Roman mathematicians who made some contributions.

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio was a Roman architect, engineer, and author who lived in the 1st century BC. He wrote a treatise on architecture called 'De architectura,' which included some mathematical principles, such as the use of the modulus in building design. The modulus is a proportional system that allows measurements to be easily scaled up or down to fit different building sizes.

Sextus Julius Frontinus was a Roman author and engineer who lived in the 1st century AD. He is best known for his writings on Roman aqueducts, which were a marvel of engineering at the time. While his writings did not contribute anything significant to mathematics, they did help to document and preserve the mathematical knowledge of the time.

Marcus Terentius Varro was a Roman scholar who lived in the 1st century BC. While he made significant contributions to fields such as linguistics, he also wrote on mathematical topics. He commented on the properties of prime numbers and squares, and also suggested that atoms might be indivisible.

Overall, while there were some Roman mathematicians who made contributions to the field, the legacy of ancient Rome in mathematics is relatively minor compared to other civilizations such as the Greeks.